


I'm in paradise with Dad

by AutumnHobbit



Series: I'm in paradise with Dad [1]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Child Death, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, One-Shot, father-son feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-15
Updated: 2017-01-15
Packaged: 2018-09-17 16:22:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,348
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9333200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AutumnHobbit/pseuds/AutumnHobbit
Summary: His breaths are hitching without his meaning to let them, but deep down, in some part of him that remembers going to church when he was a baby and hearing about God, he prays.Please. Please let him come. I don't expect him to save me. I'll come without a fight. Just please, let him be here. Please. Please let me have my dad.________Or, that prompt where Jason was still alive when Bruce found him.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I was in a kinda bad mood last night. Have an angsty drabble. 
> 
> Title from R.I.P. To My Youth by The Neighbourhood.

Jason can't breathe. Or he can, just barely. What little air he does manage to drag in tastes like blood and smoke, and does little to ease the desperate hunger in his lungs, and the slight shifting of his ribcage is so excruciating that he cries without meaning to. The tears burn his skin and itch while they trickle down his face. He can't move his hands to wipe them away. He doesn't have the energy. He barely has the strength to turn his head, lift his half-lidded eyes towards the sky...or where he thinks the sky should be. All that's there is twisted metal and wood and ash and darkness. There's an unbearably heavy weight on his back that's pinning him to the ground, restricting his breathing even more than his injuries already are. And he can't move his legs at all. He can't even feel them.

Everything hurts, hurts worse than anything in his life, even that time he'd burned himself on the stove because Mom left it running, even when he'd been shot.

He thinks he's dying.

He _knows_ he's dying.

And he can hardly bring himself to care as he lies there, his whole body throbbing but slowly fading with his heartbeat. Something makes him want to stay awake--he struggles to blink his eyes back open, trying desperately to remember what it was. How did he get here again? He doesn't know if his mother survived. Joker left.

Bruce.

He didn't think he could hurt any worse, but thinking of the man hurts worse than any of this.

Bruce, oh Bruce. He would hate himself so much when he got here. He'd tried. Jason knew he did. It's okay. He doesn't blame him. But thinking of him makes Jason blink his eyes closed against tears that he really doesn't have the energy for, _again_. His breaths are hitching without his meaning to let them, but deep down, in some part of him that remembers going to church when he was a baby and hearing about God, he prays. _Please. Please let him come. I don't expect him to save me. I'll come without a fight. Just please, let him be here. Please. Please let me have my dad._

He can't hear anything over the crackling of fire and his own rattling inhales, growing shorter and shorter and hitching with sudden, terrified sobs. He doesn't _want_ to die, he wants to go home and clean his room and hug Alfred and actually call Dick and talk to him, and apologize to Bruce for everything and tell Selena he doesn't actually hate her and--

And he just barely hears the faintest scream. It sounds like his name, but he isn't sure. So he holds as still as he can--which is fairly easy, since he doesn't have the energy to do more than twitch his fingers--and tries to breathe quietly without stopping altogether. His chest really hurts now, and he tries not to cry because he knows the jarring will just make it worse. He's starting to hyperventilate, and he's trying and failing to regulate his breathing when a piece of timber falls two feet from his face with a crash. He hears his name again, much closer this time. Bruce.

The crashing continues, and Jason hears continuing screams of his name, growing closer and more desperate. He forces himself to keep breathing, even though the pain pulsing throughout him has evolved into numbness and he's getting tired, so tired he wants to do nothing but close his eyes and rest for a while.

Through the ringing in his ears he hears the digging suddenly stop. "Oh God." He hears the faintest, shaky whisper. "Oh Jay."

Jason slowly, painstakingly peels his eyes open to slits. Just faintly, he sees the cowl hovering a ways above him. He tries to open his mouth, to say Bruce's name, but no sound comes out.

There's a thud, and suddenly Bruce is beside him, scrambling and stumbling over his own feet as he drops to his knees, crawls closer. He's somewhere above Jason and there's a loud, metallic creak right next to Jason's ear and a grunt from Bruce. The weight almost instantly disappears from his back, and Jason blinks his eyes open again--hadn't he _just_ done that?--to see Bruce tossing an iron girder away like it's a twig. He refocuses on Jason, reaches out to him but leaves his hand hovering millimeters from Jason's skin, as if he's afraid to touch him.

"Oh, Jay," Bruce says again, his voice wrecked. _"Jason."_ His hand comes down, feather-light, on Jason's head, and Jason leans into the gloved hand...or lets his head loll aimlessly, he can't tell.

"B-B...Bru--" He tries to say his name again, but the movement is too much, and his lungs start flaring up again. They burn, and blood comes up in his mouth, and he keens, feeling it spilling onto his lips and chin. A shaking hand quickly wipes it away.

"Shhh, baby, shhh." Bruce chokes, and Jason's heart hurts at how _terrified_ Bruce sounds. He feels Bruce carefully roll him onto his throbbing back, slip an arm beneath his neck and his knees, pull him into his lap. Jason's head slides into the crook of Bruce's elbow, and one of his hands flops down into his lap, limp. Bruce cradles him, strokes his bangs back from his eyes frantically.

"B-Bruce...." Jason rasps wetly, pawing feebly at Bruce's suit with his numb hand. Bruce grabs his hand, holds it tight.

"I'm here, Jason. I'm here." Bruce fumbles and pulls his hand away for a second, and Jason _whimpers_ and reaches for him, but Bruce is only ripping the cowl off, which startles him. There are tears pouring down his cheeks. Jason's never seen him cry like this before. He pulls Jason in again, sort of crumples around him, keeps stroking his hair. "I'm here. I've got you."

"'M..." Jason chokes on his own breath, coughs blood onto his mouth again before wheezing out, "'m sorry. 'M so sorry. I..." the last word stutters with pain, and he can't breathe.

"Sshhh!" Bruce's voice breaks as he continues to push back Jason's hair. Jason can feel his tears dripping onto his face. "Oh Jason, _fuck_ , this isn't your fault. This isn't your fault, it's mine."

"N-no," Jason forces out. His lips feel numb now, and his heart's doing funny things. He's so, so tired, he _knows_ he hasn't got long, so he pushes past the agony and keeps going. "You...you w're." He sobs from the pain, and not just in his body. "D-dad. M-my dad." He claws at Bruce's gauntlet, desperate.

Bruce goes stock-still, red eyes wide. It takes him another moment of Jason's labored breaths and unbearable heaviness to snap out of his shock, but when he does, he doubles over and crumples over Jason again, grasping his small hand and holding it in his much larger one. "Oh Jay. You...you're my son. My boy, and I couldn't--" Bruce sobs so hard that Jason worries for him. "I love you. I love you so much. I love you, Jason." His hand comes up to Jason's face, and he punctuates the words with a fast, hard stroke of his rough thumb against Jason's cheek.

Jason can't feel it. He can hardly find the strength to draw breath anymore, and the effort of holding his eyes open is too much. He tries to memorize Bruce's face, blurry as it is, as he lets his eyes slide closed. He feels Bruce lean down and press his forehead against Jason's. Jason feels the man's whole body shake with sobs.

Jason forces his lips to part once more, even though he knows he won't be able to make much of a sound and he's got seconds left at best. "L-Love...y-yo--"

He doesn't hear the words when he exhales them, doesn't hear Bruce's sobs double. The ringing in his ears fades, all the fight goes out of him, and all he can hear is silence.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr: autumnhobbit.tumblr.com


End file.
